2000
While the band releases a new album this year after a 3 year gap, they choose not to tour much for it. However, since the year prior they played so few shows, we can still make the bold claim that the band played 3 times the amount of live shows as the year prior! No new prefectures were played though.
Mercury/Polygram released the compilation album 97BT99 on March 29. This was a double disc compilation album of material released while Buck-Tick was signed with Mercury/PolyGram, both the album and the singles with B-sides.
U-ta makes a guest appearance on the Shammon album Lorelei which was released on April 5. He plays bass on the songs "Sontoku Kanjou" and "Subconscious Excursion".
In May, Atsushi was interviewed for the show "Best Music Japan" which was an on demand program that aired on TV Japan, a satellite service (one channel) for the Japanese community in North America.
In July, Buck-Tick officially changed labels to BMG/Funhouse. I don't know which months these events happened but as noted on their first album on BMG/Funhouse, their new manager became Takahiro Chiba. They also began gave a publishing credit to Circles Music Publishers. Perhaps with the label change they created their own publishing house to retain copyrights. This move in record companies is notable because they essentially went back to Victor. Victor was acquired by BMG and so their old record company director, Junichi Tanaka, was working in one or more of the sub-labels of BMG but it would take a few years until the band would work with him again.
On August 8, Atsushi's comments aired on the Radio Berry (FM Tochigi) show "Music Transfer." On August 27, Atsushi and U-ta appeared on the Bunka Housou (Tokyo radio) show "Countdown Sunday."
There has been a rising popularity of Buck-Tick in certain circles overseas but the amount of fans in Korea grew so much that Buck-Tick held a formal interview in Seoul, Korea. Their arrival on August 19 was greeted with many fans at the airport--it was the first time the members had been to Korea. The interview was on August 20 and a handful of devoted fans got to meet the band but they did not play live. While in Korea, the band also met with formal press. The members flew back to Japan on August 21. A Fish Tank Korea was established but I'm not sure what year it started nor when it ended. (Fish Tank is Buck-Tick's official fan club.) What is interesting to note is that around this time, there was a mutual love of pop culture from across the water as some Koreans became interested in such things as Japanese music and Japanese became interested in such things as Korean television shows and music groups. (An example of how governments divide but pop culture unites?)
I'm not sure of the name of the Korean program that the screen captures pictured here are taken from but there was also an appearance on "Let's Cast". The video file I have is corrupted and for a bit only the audio played but the file won't play at all anymore. If anyone can share this video with me, it would be greatly appreciated. It starts off with "Glamorous" playing in the background and then Atsushi introduces with "annyeong haseyo" with the band joining in to say "bakuchiku desu". The host asks questions in Korean and the band responds in Japanese (I assume there were subtitles on the screen). The video file's metadata shows it was from letscast.com and is 8min 18sec in length. Following the interview is the song "Glamorous" and I can't remember if they played it or if it was the music video but I don't think the vocals sounded exactly like the studio version.
"Glamorous", the first single from the upcoming album was released on September 6. The song's lyrics were written by Atsushi and music by Hisashi. The B-side "Trans" had lyrics by Atsushi and music by Hide. The music video for "Glamorous" was filmed to make it appear that it was the recording session for the song. This is a common format for music videos but the first time that Buck-Tick had used it. There was a video made for "Trans" as well, which is rare for a B-side but not the first time the band did so.
Buck-Tick appeared on several television shows around this time. They appeared on the Nippon TV show "MMM!" on September 5. Atsushi talked about 3 of his favorite wines and the band performed "Glamorous." Atsushi and Hisashi appeared on the Space Shower TV show "Ultra Countdown" on September 6. The band appeared on the NHK-BS2 show "Beat Motion" on September 10. Atsushi was the guest on the TV Osaka show "M-Voice" on September 11. The band made two television on apperances on September 16. (These may have been filmed previously.) First, they performed "Glamorous" on the NHK show "Pop Jam". Second, they appeared on the Asahi TV show "Minami Gokurakudou" (South Paradise Hall). They performed "Glamorous" and were interview by the hosts (comedy duo Gokuraku Tombo) and actress/singer Mari Hamada (Maki Fujii's wife at the time). Atsushi appeared on the NHK-BS2 show "Shin Mayonaka No Oukoku" on September 25. Atsushi and U-ta were interviewed on the TVK show "Music Clique" on September 26 (recorded on September 23). On October 1, the band performed "Glamorous" and "Aku No Hana" on the show "Kikan Gentei Pikapika Tennouzu Live" (also known as "Pikaten" for short). On October 10, there was a Buck-Tick special on the Sky Perfect TV show "J-Pop Street."
The album One Life, One Death was released on September 20. Buck-Tick held 3 short tours in support of the album. First they played the Phantom Tour for 8 dates beginning on September 21 in Chiba, then the Other Phantom Tour for 7 dates beginning on October 15 in Miyagi. After a month break, Buck-Tick played another short tour in support of the album entitled Tour One Life, One Death, which were 3 dates at the end of the year. This was a smaller support tour for an album than they usually hold and so several places were cut. For example, this was the first album that they did not tour to remote Okinawa since they started touring there for Aku No Hana in 1990. For the tour pamphlet, there were two versions. The green cover had photos from their trip to Korea and then later a red cover veresion was available with live concert photos.
Another way that the album was promoted was that in September a 90 second clip of the "Glamorous" music video was shown on the Hypervsn screen at the JR Harajuku Station and the full video was shown 6 times a day at all 836 locations of the family restaurant Gusto. There was also a video concert that consisted of promotional videos that the band said could not be viewed elsewhere. It was held on October 15 in Sapporo, Hokkaido, October 22 in Naha, Okinawa, and on October 28 in both Tokyo and Fukuoka.
Radio appearances were also abundant. Atsushi and Hisashi appeared on the FM802 show "Power Chord 802" on September 2. Atsushi and U-ta's comments aired on the FM802 show "Sunday Music Market." Atsushi appeared on the BayFM show "Bay Rhythmic." Atsushi and Hisashi's comments aired on the FM Kyoto show "J-Tracks." Atsushi and U-ta appeared on the Tokyo FM show "Emotional Beat" on September 18 and the Nack5 show "Midnight Rock City" on September 22. Atsushi and Hide appeared on the FM Fuji show "Alive69" on September 24. Atsushi and U-ta appeared on both the FM802 show "Rock Vision 802" and the FM Gunma show "Friday Countdown" on September 29. Hisashi appeared on the Inter FM show "Radio Babylon" on September 30. Atsushi and U-ta appeared on the Nack5 show "Nack the Night" on October 2. Atsushi and U-ta's comments aired on the FM Gunma show "Flash5" on October 2 and the FM Gunma show "Love a Go! Go!!" on October 3. Atsushi's comments aired on the FM Niigata show "Rock Street Jockey" on October 13 and the Tochigi Housou show "Music Junction" on October 22.
The band played at the Nippon Budokan on December 29, their last concert in the 20th century. This was recorded and released as both a live album and live video the following year.
